Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 8 March 2022
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport
All-Island Strategic Rail Review: Discussion (Resumed)
Mr. Richard Logue:
There is none. In particular, we have got the railway running past the city of Derry port of Lisahally. We have engaged. Into the West is continuing to engage with the managers of that port. There is potential for freight because Lisahally takes freight coming by sea into places such as north Donegal and Sligo. It is an important cross-Border port from our point of view in the Republic.
The railway, as I say, runs right past that. The capital investment involved in providing a small siding and some points would not be that big. Listening to the webinar from Derry City and Strabane District Council yesterday, a senior civil servant in the Department of transport stated that the Department is watching closely the outcome of the strategic rail review in the context of freight. The last freight trains were run on Translink's network, probably as long ago as 2002 but there is very much a need in the North, as there is down here, to reduce the amount of heavy goods vehicles, HGVs, on the roads.
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